Dangerous bottles

In the 1970s and '80s, these bottles were to be found everywhere. Get a bit of CO2 into flavoured (usually rose or lemon) water, get a marble to stop up the bottle and there, you have a drink. All you had to do was to figure out how to 'open' the bottle - pop the marble stopper out of its place and let it roll around the neck of the bottle while throwing your head back to pour the fizzy liquid down your gullet.

The bottles were also prized as a street-fighting weapon. The most elaborate use of it that I have seen was when some threw two of these bottles, one right after the other above a restive crowd. It is indescribable; two bottles filled with CO2 bumping into each other about 10-12 feet up in the air. The resulting shrapnel of glass is quite dangerous for anyone in the path.

These days, the panneer soda / goli soda bottle is available only at a few places. The drink is gentrified, and horrors - available in plastic bottles or metal cans. That may be a 'better' way to drink the soda, but what will you do when you need a new weapon on the street!